A knock-on covid wave?

David Hallsworth considers whether the effects of the pandemic will lead to a surge in dental negligence claims.

Covid-19 ripped through society and has forced change across all aspects of healthcare for years to come. Even those fortunate not to have contracted the virus or suffer severely from its effects may still face consequences, with the pandemic placing non-emergency treatments and appointments on hold in the early days.

Having dealt with the enormous pressures brought on by the pandemic, medical practitioners are now facing the immense challenge of huge treatment backlogs; this is particularly true within dentistry. Despite some emergency dental clinics staying open during the initial lockdown, all nonemergency check-ups were put on pause – and it could have left patients and practitioners open to other serious risks later down the line

Although people of all ages missed out on routine visits to the dentist, it was children who saw the largest drop in the number of appointments, with figures for under 5s falling by 60 per cent, from 1.2m in 2019 to 468,000 in 2020.